August 6, 1788 Alaska Peninsula Tsunami - Unga Narrative


Passage from Veniaminov (1840):

"That the sea had (once) been in a state of extraordinary turbulence is confirmed by the Aleut tradition which says that, during the inundation which occurred on Sannakh around 1790, the water advanced in heavy rolling swells at considerable intervals. I have seen a note in one church book written in an ancient hand, in which it said that, "In the year 1788 on the 27th of July there was a terrible inundation on Unga Island in which many Aleuts perished but God spared the Russians." And the old men say that (at this or some other time) the water rose to a height of 50 sazhen. Such a rise in the water (level) is almost incredible even if one measures not by ordinary but by hand sazhen."
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